iTunes and iPhoto for a Switcher

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juice


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So maybe I am just trying to keep a Windows experience on my new MacBook Pro, but I am struggling with deciding whether or not to let iTunes and iPhoto essentially duplicate all my files so they can have control of them.

What is the argument for allowing this?

I have 120 gb on my laptop and another 160 on a USB external. I'm not sure how to proceed here. Do I keep the files on the external and let them create libraries on my laptop?
 
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Lifeisabeach


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Just turn off the option to copy the files to the iTunes Music Library if you don't want iTunes to "have control" of them. I personally don't see what the big deal is. If you let iTunes manage their storage, everything is nice and orderly, and you are already using iTunes to listen to the music anyway. If not, then again.... so what? Any player can read the music off the iTunes library folder. You can create custom playlists to your liking also if you need some specific order to something.
 
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I agree, I used to organize my music and photo manually, but now I just let iTunes and iPhoto handle them. It's so much easier and less of a hassle.

However, if you want to keep the music and photos on the external drive, then do as lifeisabeach said and disable the option to copy the files when importing.
 
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juice


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So is it possible to cede control of the files without letting my machine duplicate them all? The issue is that I have 60 gb of music, and I don't want to double that to 120 gb.
 
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juice


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lifeisabeach said:
Just turn off the option to copy the files to the iTunes Music Library if you don't want iTunes to "have control" of them. I personally don't see what the big deal is. If you let iTunes manage their storage, everything is nice and orderly, and you are already using iTunes to listen to the music anyway. If not, then again.... so what? Any player can read the music off the iTunes library folder. You can create custom playlists to your liking also if you need some specific order to something.
Click to expand...

The big deal is that I'm worried about storage space. 60 gb of music plus importing a bunch of pictures in RAW. I may just not understand how the whole library system works.
 
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Lifeisabeach


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juice said:
So is it possible to cede control of the files without letting my machine duplicate them all? The issue is that I have 60 gb of music, and I don't want to double that to 120 gb.
Click to expand...

If you turn off the option to "copy" the music to the iTunes Music Folder, then iTunes will not copy the music over. You aren't going to mysteriously double the amount of space used to store the music or duplicate them simply by using iTunes otherwise.
 

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